At Great Ocean Properties we have developed a strong culture of professional and personal development. As part of this ongoing journey, I am attending a course at Harvard in Boston next month that I am really looking forward to. In preparation for this I have been reading the course material that has been sent to me, as they have requested.

All my adult life I have collected quotes or lines in books or slogans that have resonated with me. It’s how I remember lessons in life. I believe one well scripted line or phrase can have as much personal impact as a whole story or even book. In the past, I have gone to 3 day conferences and heard a speaker say a line that I really needed to hear at that time and remember thinking, I may as well go home now because that is the piece of
the jigsaw I came hear to find.

The course I am attending is a high level leadership development course and there are a lot of CEO case studies that I have to read. One line that stood out was a quote from a CEO of a very large company who said “Life will shape you if you let it.” In the context that it was said, he was saying the choices you make, the things that you say yes or no to, will dictate the quality of your life.

Many of us often feel that we are on the edge of being overwhelmed with all the demands on our time each day. Juggling professional, family, social and leisure/fitness activities is a constant challenge for us all and usually at least one of them suffers when another dominates. I find I really have to monitor my fatigue levels because
I know that the quality of my interactions with others, often the people you love the most, suffer when I get too tired.

What that quote said to me was, take more control of your time and what you say yes to if you want to maintain the balance in your life. We all have to do things we don’t want to in life because they just have to be done and are necessary. It’s the unnecessary aspects of our day, those that are often part of other people’s
agendas, that we need to make a decision on because life will definitely shape you if you let it.